Precious metals much like many other commodities and currencies pairs haven’t done much yesterday as both gold and silver slightly declined. Other currencies including the Aussie dollar and Canadian dollar also slightly fell against the USD. The main even of the week will unfold today as the Fed will announce of any changes to its asset purchase program. If the FOMC will change or hint of potential future change this could lead to sharp rise in market volatility in today’s trading. See here for live update on the Fed’s conference and decision. Besides the FOMC statement, on today's agenda: Minutes of MPC Meeting, German 10 Year Bond Auction, Governor Poloz speaks and China flash Manufacturing PMI.

On Tuesday, gold fell again by 1.18% to $1,366; Silver also declined by 0.37% to $21.68. During June, gold declined by 1.86%; silver, by 2.48%.

On Today's Agenda

FOMC Meeting and Forecast: In the last meeting the FOMC kept its policy unchanged. The table below shows the reaction of precious metals in the two days following the previous FOMC meetings in 2012 and 2013. Moreover, Bernanke’s testimony didn’t offer any big headlines, even though he did suggest that tapering the current asset purchase program isn’t off the table and could happen in the near future. Considering the inflation is still very low, the unemployment is still well above the Fed’s goal of 6.5% and economic growth isn’t stable, I suspect the Fed won’t change its policy this time. If the Fed will surprise and change or even hint of future change to its asset purchase program; this could rally the USD and consequently pressure down gold and silver.

China flash Manufacturing PMI: this index is based on a survey that covers 800 companies in 20 industries in China; in the previous HSBC Manufacturing PMI survey regarding May 2013 the Manufacturing PMI slipped to 49.6; this index indicates China's manufacturing sectors have contracted; if the index will continue to fall, this may adversely affect commodities;